A Charmed Life (22 page)

The play-reading proceeded. Warren, choking back his emotions, acted as monitor. He and Jane—he explained to the newcomers, with a bitter glance at his mate—had read aloud so many times, both to each other and in groups, that they had worked out a set of rules for it. Nobody was to interrupt the reading during an act; at the end of each act, questions of translation could be asked. Questions of interpretation were to be deferred until the whole play had been read, and no side remarks were tolerated. Laughing was strictly forbidden except in the case of a comedy. Drinks were served
after
the reading. As he enunciated these rules, hollow laughter echoed in the chambers of his heart. He felt like that French schoolmaster giving the Last Class in conquered Alsace-Lorraine. His marriage was over, probably, after tonight, now that Jane had let him know how she really felt about things. He loved her, and she considered it a weakness. To go on after that would be hypocrisy.

Rules,
he said to himself wanly. He and Jane made them together, and then she broke them. It was just like these play-readings, where he, poor simp, tried to keep order and everybody laughed at him. And the regulations they had made—except the one about drinking—were harder on him than anybody. When an interesting point came up, he could hardly hold himself in; waiting till the end for a discussion was agony, especially since by the time they had finished, nobody else ever seemed to remember the passage he had in mind. But it was not fair to the author, he and Jane had agreed, to pick a play to pieces before it had had a chance to say its whole say.

Yet she was always one of the worst offenders, giggling and interrupting and popping her eyes or making trips to the kitchen during the most significant parts. Every time they read aloud, he constantly had to remind her that the play or the poem had the floor. But tonight, as he slowly became aware, she was more subdued than usual, as if she knew what she had done to him and the reckoning that lay ahead for both of them, after the others had gone. She did not poke him when Miles gave a funny reading or when Martha overacted her part. She sat listening, thoughtfully, her chin sunk in her hand. Her mind, he could suddenly tell, was a million miles away from him, though he could feel the comfortable warmth of her big vital body next to him, on the hassock. She had no idea how she had wounded him, evidently, and, soothed by her physical presence, he gradually let himself relent toward her, even though he knew that this was the worst crime one human could commit against another: not to take their words seriously. When she turned and smiled at him, vaguely, during the first intermission, he smiled back and wiggled his ears slightly, feeling like Judas Iscariot.

He turned his attention to the play. He had hoped he would like it better in French than he had when the two of them had read it in English, but instead it let him down even more. Unlike Jane, he was not musical, and that, he guessed, was the trouble: the jingling alexandrines sounded monotonous to him, even when Paul was reading. He liked Dolly best; her accent was neat and pretty, though she did not put much expression into her lines. Martha and the vicomte were frowning over their text when Dolly came to the big scene of despair and jealousy in the fourth act, where she was supposed to be waiting for Titus in a state of extreme disorder. Martha, as her waiting woman, read her own lines with unnecessary urgency, as if she were trying to push Dolly into the proper mood:

“Mais voulez-vous paraître en ce désordre extrême? Remettez vous, madame, et rentrez en vous-même. Laissez-moi relever ces voiles dédachés, Et ces cheveux épars dont vos yeux sont cachés. Souffrez que de vos pleurs je répare l’outrage.”

This sounded very comical, in Martha’s quick, passionate voice, while Dolly sat there, cool as a cucumber, not a silvery blond hair out of place. Even Miles looked up and chuckled when Dolly replied, in her circumspect tinkling bell-tones:
“Laisse, laisse, Phénice; il verra son ouvrage.”
Warren had to call twice for silence before Dolly could go on with her part. She was at her best, Warren thought, in the final passage, when she turned to the vicomte, with imperturbable dignity, like the senior prefect in her boarding school:

“Sur Titus et sur moi, réglez votre conduite. Je l’aime, je le fuis; Titus m’aime; il me quitte. Portez loin de mes yeux vos soupirs et vos fers. Adieu. Servons tous trois d’exemple à l’univers.”

It was a pretty poor example they were going to set the universe, in Warren’s opinion, but at least Dolly gave him the idea that a person
could
feel that way.

Unfortunately, he missed the first part of the discussion, because he was busy fixing drinks for everybody. Even Jane wanted one, to his surprise; she asked for a bourbon and fizzy, and drank it straight down when he brought it. “I was thirsty,” she said. All the dinner guests were thirsty, it turned out; there had been a mite too much salt in the roast. Dolly took a glass of port, and the vicomte joined her. “I thought you didn’t drink,” exclaimed Martha, tactlessly, for the vicomte often drank, in moderation, since his reform. The Hubers and Martha had Scotch; Miles had a big drink of bourbon, to wet his whistle, as he called it. Warren himself had a glass of plain fizzy, when he finally joined the circle. Martha and Miles, on good terms again, were talking about the influence of Port Royal on Racine, and the Hubers seemed rather out of it. They had had the smallest parts—Titus’s and Antiochus’s confidants—and people always forgot that they were not intellectuals. Warren brought the subject back to the play, which they could all share.

“How terribly Protestant it is,” said Dolly, making a little face. “But naturally,” said the vicomte. “Port Royal was Jansenist. That is a Protestant heresy. Racine had it in his bones.” “Why do you say ‘Protestant,’ Miss Lamb?” demanded Harriet Huber. “What’s the difference, Miss Lamb?” Martha answered for her, taking a long drink. “Setting a good example. Renunciation. Training the will. Scruples.” “But don’t the Catholics have those?” Harriet asked the vicomte. “We are not puritans,” said the vicomte, sipping his port. “Miles,” said Martha suddenly, “how would you distinguish between the Corneillean will and the Racinian will? There’re the same conflicts, in Corneille, between passion and duty, between the state and the family, between the family and the single person. Yet you couldn’t say that Corneille was Protestant. …” Warren’s head kept turning eagerly, back and forth, from face to face; it made him feel as if he were watching a tennis match. “Well,” said Miles, cautiously, “in Corneille, I would say there was more feeling for power. It’s an imperial will, in Corneille, swelling out to world-domination. He wrote a
Bérénice
too, you know.” “Maybe we ought to read that next,” proffered Warren conscientiously. “To get both sides—” “A Renaissance will,” broke in Martha. “The difference between setting an example, like Titus and Bérénice, and dominating through your will, like the people in
Cinna
or the
Cid. ‘Je suis maître de moi comme de l’univers. Je suis, je veux l’être.’
Do you remember that, Dolly, from college?” “I hated it, said Dolly, with feeling. “It’s more Faustian in Corneille, wouldn’t you say, Miles?” persisted Martha. “And isn’t there something else? In Racine the conflict of passions is more internalized, within the soul of the character—his famous ‘psychological realism.’ The soul, in Racine, is an arena, full of sinuous savage beasts leaping at the whip.” “Good Heavens,” said Harriet Huber. “
‘Vénus toute entière à sa proie attachée
,’” quoted Miles. “If you remember your Phèdre. The beast within. A thoroughly Protestant vision, I agree, Miss Lamb.” Dolly colored. “Love, in Racine,” pursued Martha, with a significant glance at Dolly, as if reminding her of some earlier conversation, “love is seen as a sort of diabolical possession—witchcraft. Poor Phèdre. Racine made her a great heroine by giving her a bad conscience. It’s more sensual that way too. She hates herself and this passion that fastens itself on her, like a bird of prey.”

“Let’s get back to
Bérénice
for a minute,” urged Warren. “I’d like to hear what the rest of you think about the philosophy in there.” “‘Philosophy’?” questioned the vicomte. “There is no philosophy in
Bérénice.”
“Warren means a philosophy of life,” said Martha. “Isn’t it the same thing?” protested Warren. “No,” said Miles. “Gee, I’d like to discuss that with you,” said Warren. “Later, my boy,” said Miles. “Let’s stick to the subject.” “Well, but …” said Warren, hesitantly. He wanted to point out that no discussion could be worth anything if you did not go back and define your principles, but he could see the impatience in both Miles’s and Martha’s faces. He conquered his disappointment. “What I want to know,” he began, “is whether this play makes you as mad as it does me. It makes me want to eat nails.” “Why, Warren?” said Martha gently. “The way I see it,” said Warren, “that Titus is a prig and a hypocrite. He was no gentleman, if you’ll pardon my French.” “Why?” said Dolly. “He was engaged to Bérénice, darn it,” cried Warren, “and then he broke his promise to her, just for reasons of state. I call that pretty cheap. He owed it to her to marry her, when he’d been engaged to her for five years.” “And she wasn’t getting any younger,” said Martha, with a laugh.

“But his father died, dearie,” said Jane. “When he got to be Caesar, he couldn’t marry her, because of that old law.” “He should have thought of that before he got engaged to her,” Warren said hotly. “He knew the law and he knew his father was going to die some time. And it strikes me,” he continued, emboldened, when nobody answered, “it strikes
me
Racine was pretty much of a faker not to have
made
that point in the play. If Shakespeare wrote that play, he darn well would have showed what a son of a bitch Titus really was.” Miles looked at Martha, who looked at Dolly. Warren could tell from their expressions that they thought he had made a point. “You’re right in a way, of course,” said Martha finally. “Don’t you think so, Miles? In a play by Shakespeare, Titus might have been shown up a little, like Prince Hal. It’s the same plot, really, when you think about it. A playboy prince and his boon companions. The education of a king. When the prince’s father dies, the prince, rather priggishly, sends his companions away. The rejection of Falstaff isn’t too different from the rejection of Bérénice, only in Racine it’s called renunciation. Probably Shakespeare,” she went on, with an apologetic smile at the vicomte, “is truer to the way things happen. One never knows, in real life, exactly how much self-interest or surfeit there is in these great renunciations.”

“That’s all old stuff,” said Jane. “People don’t renounce any more, unless they’re compulsive or something.” “There was Kierkegaard,” said Warren.
“I
gave up my singing career for Harold,” observed Harriet. “Probably you wanted to anyway,” said Jane, candidly. “I mean, would you have given up Harold for your singing? I’ll bet Prince Hal was bored stiff with Falstaff. He sounds just like some of the people around here. And I’ll bet Titus, underneath, was anti-Semitic. It says right here in the play that he doesn’t want to get mixed up with Bérénice’s Jewish relations.” Laughter shook the room. “Jane’s right,” said Warren, stoutly. “Act II, Scene 2. Shall I read it?” “We remember,” said Harold Huber. “Those two queens, wasn’t it, of Bérénice’s blood, who married a slave or something?” Warren nodded. “But that isn’t anti-Semitism, Mr. Coe,” protested Dolly. “Something pretty darn close to it,” said Warren. “It shows what kind of a guy Titus was that he’d listen to an argument like that.”

Miles sighed. “Racine wasn’t interested in character,” he said. “You have to get that through your noodle. You can’t judge him the way you do Shakespeare. Shakespeare was interested in politics and political types, which means he was interested in motive—the thing that makes people move, the way they do, in society. Underneath, of course, you’ll find the archaic patterns. The death of the father alters the Oedipal constellation; the son, so to speak, intromits the father, swallows him, and assumes his primordial role. That’s what we see happening underneath the surface of both these plays—the
Henry IV
sequence and
Bérénice.
The renunciation of Bérénice may involve a belated rejection of the mother, the feminine component, in Titus; you see the same thing with Falstaff, whose relation with Prince Hal was suspiciously homosexual.” Jane adjusted an earring. “That’s what I always told you,” she said to Warren, who nodded sadly.

“What about the death of the mother, Miles?” inquired Harold Huber. “That doesn’t have the same importance,” said Miles. “Not for the normal man, in his prime. The normal man outlives the mother while she’s still hale and hearty. It’s only in pathological instances that you find a son coming into manhood, finally, when the mother passes on.” Jane sat picking at a spot on her skirt. For some reason, she kept staring at Miles’s shoes, which were black and very shiny looking, cut almost like a pair of slippers. “Still, Miles,” she said casually, “in our culture you’ll find a lot of fuss about the death of the mother. Or do you think that’s all commercialized, like Mother’s Day and Christmas?” “Purely ritualistic,” said Miles. “Contrary to popular opinion, the mother doesn’t count in the American scene. I used to see it in my practice. She lives too damn long. Of course, there’s a certain amount of guilt among the descendants when they eventually get rid of the old girl. Half racial memory; half social uneasiness. They think they’re expected to feel something.”

There was a silence. If Warren was a fair sample, they were all thinking about Harriet, who was three times a grandmother and devoted to her two sons. “An angel just passed over,” she said brightly. “The angel of death,” said the vicomte, crossing himself. Harriet turned to him. “I was just reading an article,” she said. “By a Protestant minister. About how people are going back to religion. I never felt the need of it myself, but perhaps that shows I’m a back number.” “Like all of us,” said Martha, sharply. “None of us, except the vicomte, are religious.” “But what about church attendance figures?” ventured Harriet. “Aren’t modern people supposed to be feeling a lack in their lives that they need religion to fill?” Martha shrugged. “An advertising gambit,” she said. “First you convince people they lack something and then you sell them a product to remedy it. People ‘need’ religion to ‘deepen their awareness’ or give them ‘tragic irony’—the way I ‘need’ a facial cream to make my life more glamorous.” Warren felt a little embarrassed, on account of Paul; if Martha were completely sober, she would not have flared up like that. “But if there is a lack, Martha?” said Dolly. “Then it ought
not
to be filled,” said Martha. “If it’s a real lack, it’s a necessary hollow in life that can’t be stuffed up, like a chicken. Insufficiency. Shortcoming. I don’t need God as a measure to feel that. Do you, Dolly?” “God,
no!”
said Dolly.